Monday, December 08, 2003

Central issue.............cont'd.

To tell the truth, I hesitated to talk about this issue from the beginning. I have to say it again, I’m not discussing which part is wrong and which is right, not the issue of Israel vs. Palestine, not the issue of Jews vs. Muslims, not west vs. east (is it necessary that there is always a vs.?). And I’m not implying that the GC or the future Iraqi government should start peace talks with Israel immediately (as much as it's a good cause yet it still seems too early-for Iraq-to make such decisions).
I’m just trying to explain:
- Why Arabs care for Palestinian rights more than they do for their own.
-The way the Arab governments dealt with the conflict and its effect (the way) on Arabs (Palestinians included) in general and Iraqis in particular.
-Why the Arab and Muslim countries have a passive (if not aggressive) approach towards free Iraq.
Now let's get back to where we stopped last time:
Whenever some of my Iraqi fellow citizens start to whine about the Palestinians killed in the (Intifadah)-provoked by the dramatic scenes and reports from the local TV (now Al-Jazeerah and Al-Arabia), I used to reason with them: Shouldn't we care about our children as well?
Yes, I too feel sorry for the Palestinians, not because they are harshly treated by Israel (after 3 years of Intifadah, the number of Palestinian causalities is far less than what S.H or Abdul Nasser could consider a full month job) and certainly not because of their tragic living conditions (most of the Palestinians kids, I have seen, were dressed much more properly than 90% of the Iraqi kids) but I do feel sorry for them because -they too- are the victims of our tyrants and their media, who managed to convince them that they're fighting a holly war, and that each one of them dies during this fight will go straight to paradise. The poor lads believed it and threw themselves into the flames (and still do so) only for the joy of our dictators, who would use their mighty media horns to slap us on the face saying "stop complaining and demanding luxuries, look at your brothers in religion, your Arab brothers, being killed and tortured by the Zionists, at least you're free!!! While their land had been occupied and their homes destroyed by your eternal enemy. Join the battle, support the Intifadah, and when we get rid the Zionists and free Palestine; all your wishes will come true".
But they, and it seemed that only they (in the Arab world at least), knew that this battle would never be won, and they kept sure that the other possible end (peace) remains almost impossible.
It’s just like that windmill in the (Animal farm). NO, this is not the central issue, the central issue is: millions of Iraqis killed and tortured by S.H, it's more than a 100 thousand Algerians murdered in the last 12 years (both by the fundamentalists and the army) and it's hundreds of thousand of Sudani people killed in the civil war, it's tens of thousands of Syrians killed within few days by Asad the father (in Hims and Hamah), its 100s of thousands Arab citizens detained for years all over the Arab world for merely expressing their opinions, it's more than 250 million citizens of deep-rooted cultures living under the rule of cruel ignorant tyrants such as S.H, Gaddafi, the Assad dynasty and to put it short, all the Arab governments with very few exceptions.
That's what a real (Arab nationalist) should consider as the central issue, but for the man with an open mind and heart, it's much more than that. It is the oppression, injustice, poverty, diseases and ignorance anywhere on this planet. All seem to have one thing in common!.
Now let's get back to our central issue.
This vicious circle of wars, oppression and hatred can never be broken by opening dialogue channels or building walls between the two concerned parties as long as the (hate producing reactors)are still functioning. It can only be solved in Baghdad, Cairo, Damascus, Yemen, Jeddah, Tehran and Islam Abaad.
If I were Israeli I wouldn’t be too eager to make agreements with governments that don’t represent more than 1% of their people at best.
On the other hand, free Arab and Muslim people living in democratic prosperous environment will find it more reasonable and much easier to conduct a real peace process and put an end to this conflict that caused tragedies that had way surpassed any possible gain that may be obtained by winning it.
In the past few years, the US administration, supported by the British government has changed its policy in the ME and changed the priority from the Israeli/Palestinian conflict to the war on terrorism and totalitarian regimes in the region, starting with Iraq.
Yes, the first step on the road starts from Baghdad. The next? OOOOH!, that what makes them so frenzy.
Each one of those dictators knows that even if it wasn’t him who’s the second on the list, it takes only one or two more tyrannies to fall, and there will be no enough steam to keep the engine running. Then the work on their precious (windmill) will be finished, and they will be left without any excuse to justify their citizens’ misery.
And as those people have passed the point of no return, they have no other choice but to unite and fight against the obviously oncoming changes in Iraq, they even dared to really stand against the USA, something they never dared to do in the past except in their (for internal use propaganda).
As desperate as they seem, they do have a chance of achieving one of three objectives:
-(this is their dream)Helping the terrorists to inflict as much casualties as possible among the coalition forces to force them abandon their task.
-Creating a situation of disharmony (relying on the ethnic and religious differences)in the hope that this will lead to civil war, just as they did in Lebanon.
-(this seems to be their best chance)Making the Iraqis pay a very high price for their freedom, so that their own people may refrain from demanding it when seeing how much it cost.
My word to them: “IN YOUR DREAMS”, The wind of freedom has already started to whiffle, and no matter what you do, you can not stop it.